How to Cope with the Death of a Parent

Dealing with the death of a parent can be one of the hardest times in your entire life. This is why we use the term “coping with” instead of getting over it–because it’s not something that you will truly be able to overcome. Everyone finds their own way to cope with the situation and accept what’s happened so that they can remember their parents but still continue to live their lives to the fullest.

Processing this situation can take a lot of time and being able to accept your feelings and deal with the outcome can be difficult. So to help you cope, we’ve prepared a couple of helpful points that you should try to follow so that you can move forward in life.

Coping with the Death of a Loved One

Embrace your feelings

Whether you’re feeling sad, upset or possibly angry, don’t ignore your feelings. Don’t tell people that you’re going to be strong and not mourn, or don’t try and avoid your feelings by saying that you’re not going to cry. You need to accept your feelings and mourn at your own pace. Not everyone can get over the death of a parent easily and it’s going to take a varying amount of time from person to person.

Embrace the feelings and emotions you’re feeling and remember that mourning is part of the process of coping with the death. Sometimes it’ll take a few weeks, other times it might take several years. Whatever happens, keep a hold of your emotions and accept that it’s how you feel.

Remember your parent

Your parents have and always will be a big part of your life. Even if they’ve passed away, they’re going to still be in your memories and can even become a big part of your motivation in the future. Whether you’ve taken photographs together or created something together in the past, keep a hold of those memories and make sure you don’t try to shut them out and forget them.

However, you should also not obsess over your parents either. You may find that if you fail to remember something like a special date you spent together, you’ll feel incredibly sad and maybe even upset or angry with yourself. Don’t worry about the little things and do your best. You may even want to speak to friends or family members to help you remember the experiences you had.

Your parent would want you to move on

Even though moving on can be incredibly difficult, you need to remember that your parent would want you to move on and continue living your life the way you want to. They would want to see you successful, living a life that you’ve worked for instead of being held back by negative thoughts and mourning.

Make sure you stay focused even if you have to mourn. They wouldn’t want to see you give up your job or become depressed to a point where you’ve lost all motivation to do what you love doing, so remember to look forward and move on, despite how difficult it may be.

If Your Loved One Passes, We’re Here for You

If your loved one has passed away, contact our funerals director at Casa de Paz Funeraria. We can lead you to the best steps for what to do when someone dies, and create a memorial service to honor your loved one.